


Untune the Sky

by DoreyG



Category: Coriolanus - Shakespeare
Genre: Alien Invasion, Alternate Universe - Apocalypse, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Arguing, Enemies Working Together, Implied Sexual Content, M/M, Yuletide Treat
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2015-11-16
Updated: 2015-11-16
Packaged: 2018-05-01 22:42:31
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,162
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/5223749
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/DoreyG/pseuds/DoreyG
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>“This,” he says flatly, “is the most ridiculous situation I’ve ever had the misfortune to find myself in. And that includes literally all of the debates you made me sit through before this whole mess started.”</p>
            </blockquote>





	Untune the Sky

**Author's Note:**

  * For [fallingvoices](https://archiveofourown.org/users/fallingvoices/gifts).



> Broadly set in a modern AU, with some visual cues taken from the 2011 film, but mostly set in a post apocalypse AU.

“This,” he says flatly, “is the most ridiculous situation I’ve ever had the misfortune to find myself in. And that includes literally all of the debates you made me sit through before this whole mess started.”

Coriolanus gives him a flat look, a look so flat that you could probably balance peas on it if you were willing to put in the effort, and grunts. Typical, just his luck to get stuck with a brainless thug who can seemingly communicate only in grunts and scowls.

“An alien invasion – with actual aliens! From space! In possession of laser beams! – where I have to collaborate with my very worst political enemy or else get turned into ash,” he huffs, stubbornly continues talking in the face of Coriolanus’ stony silence. The man doesn’t have a laser beam, even if he does snap it’ll be a noble death, “at least the universe has finally grown a sense of humour. Several years too late, granted, but who am I to judge its sense of timing?”

Coriolanus only grunts again. And, look, he knows that it sounds paranoid but he’s honestly starting to suspect that the man is only silent around him. He seemed perfectly chatty earlier, after all, with his thuggish troops that were so convinced they were in the right. And he did manage to win over all of Rome, which must’ve involved at least one conversation. It might just be him that he’s taken against. Him, the uncultured barbarian who has only ever wanted a few more rights and a little less deprivation.

Well, fuck him. If he didn’t want to be here, able to rely only on his worst enemy, he shouldn’t have fucked up the rest of his life so badly that the planet got invaded by aliens. He debates sulking for a moment more, and then decides that implied pity is the far more mature reaction, “have you seen anything out there, oh fearless leader?”

“...Nothing,” it finally gets him words, at least, so he’s going to count it as a victory. It’s the first bright spot he’s had in a week, he’s going to take what he can get, “the coast seems clear.”

“Thank the gods,” he says wryly, and reacts little further. He can save the proper celebration until tonight, hopefully after they’ve found enough alcohol to forget that any of this impossible situation is happening, “mine, not yours, obviously. Do you think we’ll be able to clear out soon?”

“Maybe,” a long moment of silence. Because he has nothing better to do he patiently waits to see whether it’ll end in a song and dance routine, “and find my mother.”

“My people before your mother,” he says sharply, perhaps a little too loudly judging by the hunted look that Coriolanus throws to the ash-clogged sky. He doesn’t care, they’ve been having this argument for what feels like weeks straight at this point and he’s always had a temper, “that’s what we agreed, that’s my price for putting up with you. We find my people, we make sure that they’re safe, and then we move on to your concerns.”

Coriolanus grinds his teeth, still staring at the sky. He fancies that he’s started to be able to read the man by now, and that expression – pouty and huffy and more like a spoilt teenager than the fully grown terror of Rome - is most certainly what he’d call vexed, “maybe I’m changing it.”

“Then maybe you’re dying,” he snaps, and has all the pleasure of Coriolanus’ full attention dropping to him – eyes wide and slightly disbelieving, as if he honestly doesn’t quite understand why anybody would even make the slightest threat against his ever so precious life, “either by my hand, or because I make a hell of a lot of noise and call the aliens down on our heads. It’s your choice.”

A long pause, as Coriolanus continues to stare at him with wide eyes and sceptically tight mouth.

That’s his problem, really, that’s _always_ been his problem. The man is seemingly unable to comprehend how his actions might meet with disapproval from others. From his earliest days in the senate, where he snarled down their desperate requests for equality just because he lived in a comfortable home, to just before the aliens arrived, when he couldn’t understand why his people turned on him for treating them with open scorn. He’s never been able to see anything outside of himself, his own concerns, what _he_ feels.

It has, he will admit, created a singularity of purpose that is almost admirable at times. Just a pity, that it’s also the most obnoxious thing that he’s ever encountered in all of his long and stubbornly lived life.

“I... Shall consider it.”

For he has met obnoxious men, he has met obnoxious women, he has met obnoxious people of all genders in his long life. He has yelled down presidents, he has glared at queens, he has sworn blithely in the face of people he should _cower_ at. And despite that, despite _all_ that endless annoyance, Caius Marcius Coriolanus is the most _obnoxious_ creature-

“Aufidius?”

That he has ever had the misfortune to-

“ _Aufidius_?”

…Wait a second.

Because apparently the apocalypse, he knows that humanity has no chance of surviving this and he’s never much been in the habit of lying to himself, is the place for miracles. Because apparently the universe does have a sense of humour, beneath all the grime and vaporized remains. He stares for a second and then grins, just a touch helplessly, “does that count as a yes?”

Coriolanus only grunts, openly rolls his eyes like the spoiled brat he is. And he knows that’s as close as he’s going to get to a confirmation.

“Oh, do try not to look so sour about it,” he purrs, perhaps a touch smugly, and sidles up close – briefly slips his arm around Coriolanus’s broad shoulders, and smirks right into his battered face, “look, when we stop for tonight I’ll let you fuck me. I’ll even blow you beforehand, if you want. Sound like a good enough deal to keep yourself from getting horribly killed by multiple creatures?”

Coriolanus grunts again. But, if he glances closely... Yes, that is a flash of reluctant humour lurking in the depths of the man’s angry eyes, a fluttering ember that just needs the right person to coax it to life, “we should get moving.”

“Until tonight?” He purrs, and can’t help himself from laughing softly as Coriolanus shoulders his weapon with a low flush and stalks out into the empty wreck of the post invasion street. It’s cruel to bait him, perhaps, but he just can’t _resist_. The man is so sulky, so battered, so reluctantly appealing to him in every way that it is so very hard to hold himself back.

Besides, the universe’s sense of humour is firmly tilted against him. He has to take his amusement when and where he can.


End file.
